PARAPHRASING the
poet laureate of ancient Greece, a resident of twentieth century
Troy might well state that the generations
of students a t R.P.I. replace each other as the leaves on the trees. For one
who has seen one generation go and another take its place, it is interesting
to note the changes brought about a t the oldest engineering school of the country
in the short space of 25 years. To Amos Eaton, its founder, were he alive today,
the metamorphosis in 125 years from a school with one full-time professor and
less than 30 pupils into a “po1y”-technic institute with over 4000 students
would seem nothing short of miraculous.

The late President Ricketts, shortly
before his death in 1934, published the third and last edition of his history
of the Institute and little of interest could be added here in the way of general
information. This article, therefore, deals with the Institute’s history only
in so far as it concerns the teaching of chemistry. This branch of the so-called
“natural sciences” played an important part in the early years, then suffered
a gradual decline. It regained its former status, first slowly around 1885 and
more rapidly since 1910, so that, at present, chemistry and chemical engineering
occupy a prominent place among the 12 courses of study now pursued at the Institute.

It is only a few years ago that Miss
E. M. McAllister, Eaton’s latest biographer, came across a letter written by
Eaton to Stephen Van Rensselaer, which indicates that it was the need for equipment
and apparatus used in teaching “practical chemistry,” which induced the “patroon”
to act as patron of science. This letter, written on the back of a circular
issued by Eaton and dated Aug. 24, 1824, contains the following passages:

After my last interview
with you, I concluded to make a trial as before stated in this circular, with
a few young men at my own risque.
Since this was printed, about 30 young gentlemen have proposed spending the
winter with me. This number will require considerable apparatus. As usual, I again turned my mind to
the almost only patron of science in our country. If you
could make up your mind in favor of furnishing apparatus to the value of about
three hundred dollars (let me select it economically) I could go on and pay
myself with student’s fees. The apparatus to remain your property, and I would engage to keep it in good repair, and to supply all articles which
happen to be broken or injured. In addition to the benefit of the loan of apparatus
(which I feel unable to purchase)
I could then have the great additional benefit of
announcing the School as under
your sanction and patronage. This will be the first attempt in the world. And
I am very desirous that the plan be fostered by
the same patronage which originated the most extensive geological survey in
the world.

Eaton had fixed up six rooms in his
place of residence for a classroom, a library, three laboratories, and a museum
of specimens. This unpretentious “RensselaerSchool” (Figure 1), a two-story brick colonial
building with a one-story addition on the side, located in North Troy, was formerly used as a bank and
hence was known as the Old Bank Place. It was occupied from 1824 to 1834 and again from 1841 to
1844. Here “Amos Eaton, Esq., of Troy, Professor of chemistry and natural
philosophy and lecturer on geology, land surveying, etc.” taught his first classes
according to an entirely novel scheme, outlined in the first school catalog
of 1826 in the following manner:

The most distinctive character
in the plan of the school consists in giving the pupil the place of teacher.
From schools and colleges where the highest branches are taught to the common
schools, the teacher always improves himself more than he does his pupils…

Taking advantage of this
principle, students of RensselaerSchool learn by giving experimental and demonstrative lectures.
In every branch of learning the pupil begins with its practical application
and is introduced to a knowledge
of elementary principles from time to time as his progress requires. After visiting
a bleaching factory, he returns to the laboratory and produces the chlorine
gas and experiments on it until he is familiar with all the elementary principles
appertaining to that curious substance…

The same catalog stated further:

For admission each student
must pay $25.00 to the treasurer. Board in the commons amounts to about $1.50
a week. Expenses for chemical substances and damages to apparatus ought not
to exceed 2 or 3 dollars for each term.

Each student was required to give
in the winter term 15 lectures on chemical powers and substances not metallic
and 15 lectures on metalloids, metals, soils, manures, mineral waters and animal
and vegetable matter. In the spring term these lectures were 10 and 10, respectively.
As a text Eaton’s “Chemical Instructor” was used.

Degrees of Bachelor of Arts in RensselaerSchool were given after one year of residence
on the satisfactory passing of a final oral examination. Eaton, a prolific writer
on all branches of natural science, made important contributions to geology
and several of his pupils became noted geologists. His chemistry texts were
reviewed by the writer some years ago.[1] Although highly successful as a teacher, Eaton was hopelessly
inefficient as an administrator and his financial backer Van Rensselaer had
to supply over $20,000 in 8 years to support the school: His total contributions
from 1824 to 1839, the year of his death, amounted to well over $30,000. Of
Eaton’s pupils there are only a few that made a name for themselves in chemistry, viz., Robert
Peter, James Booth, and Eben N. Horsford.
Quite a number of entering students were college graduates and several of them
became physicians in later life.

Eaton’s original idea was to train
young people to become teachers of science. This is clearly stated in a letter
which Eaton wrote to the first president of the school, the Rev. Dr. Blatchford
in which he said:

My principal object is
to qualify teachers for instructing the sons and daughters of farmers and mechanics
by lectures or otherwise with the application of experimental chemistry, philosophy
and natural history, agriculture, domestic economy, arts and manufactures.

To this end he induced his patron
to offer free tuition to prospective candidates
who agreed to teach a t least for one year in country schools after graduating
from RensselaerSchool. This scheme, however, fell through.
The times were not yet ripe for the establishment of teacher’s colleges. There
was, evidently, at that time, greater need for engineers. This demand was met
by the greater emphasis laid on engineering subjects in Eaton’s later years.
From 1835 on, degrees of Civil Engineer (C.E.) were conferred and the old A.B.
degree was replaced by that of B.N.S. (Bachelor of Natural Science). At the
same time (around 1833) the school was designated as Rensselaer Institute. Eaton’s
interest in chemistry having subsided meanwhile, he devoted the remaining years
of his life (1835- 42) to civil engineering and geology. The teaching of chemistry
was turned over to his pupil James Hall (1811-97), for 62 years (1835-97) State
Geologist of New York. Besides chemistry, Hall also taught “physiology, including
the elements of organic chemistry.” In Hall’s time the tuition had gone up to
$45 a year, board and lodging to $3 a week, while extra expenses in chemistry amounted to $8.
Hall was succeeded in 1841 by another of Eaton’s pupils, George H. Cook (1818-89),
a C.E. and B.N.S. of the class of 1839, described in the catalog of 1841 as
“an experienced chemist, who has been a successful teacher a t this Institute
for 3 terms.”

Figure 1

On Cook’s shoulders fell the task of
carrying on as senior professor and professor of civil engineering, geology,
etc., when Eaton died in 1842. This was a heavy load to carry with only one
part-time coworker: Dr. John Wright, M.D. (later F. B. Leonard, M.D.), teaching
botany and zoology. Cook resigned in 1846 and became later connected with RutgersCollege, winding up his brilliant career
as State Geologist of New Jersey. In 1847, Cook’s place was taken by Eaton’s
pupil, Benjamin Franklin Greene, C.E., A.M., of the class of 1842, who became
the first director, and professor of mathematics and physics, being at the same
time placed “provisionally in charge of mineralogy, chemistry, and geology.”
Greene fully justified the hopes of his parents who had named their offspring
after America’s foremost scientist. He was a man
of initiative and foresight who felt that the time had come for a radical change.
His coming to Troy coincided with the founding of the Lawrence Scientific School
at Harvard by Eaton’s pupil, Horsford, of a similar school at Yale (later the Sheffield
Scientific School), and the establishment of a course in civil engineering at
the University of Michigan in 1847. In less than 4 years Greene transformed
the institute into a polytechnic institute with courses spread over a period
of 3 years, later extended to 4 years by the inclusion of a “preparatory class.”
Greene at once increased his teaching staff by the addition of 2 “repeaters”
and 1 instructor. The repeaters were the American equivalent of the répétiteurs
of the BcolePolytechnique and the BcoleCentrale des Arts et Manufactures,
the two models which the Institute most closely resembled. The roles which chemistry
and physics were to play in the new setup were outlined in the catalog of 1854
as follows:

In chemistry and physics,
the student is expected to avail himself of the resources of experiment and
observation. The study of chemistry with its facts and philosophy is made a school of mental and mechanical training of fundamental
importance, not for the acquirement of chemical knowledge only, but as presenting
a most
favorable introduction to the general study of experimental science and as constituting an element of preparation essential
to the business of research.

It was Greene’s intention to acquire
a t once a resident full professor in general and analytical chemistry and also,
as soon as the necessary funds could be secured, a professor of chemical technology.
Meanwhile, these professorships were temporarily filled by Greene, first alone
and later in part also by his colleague, E. A. H. Allen, of the class of 1850
who held the chair of geology from 1850 to 1854 and that of natural history
from 1854 to 1855.

With the appointment of William
Elderhorst (1828-61) as professor of theoretical and practical chemistry and
mineralogy, in 1855, the Institute entered upon its “Woehlerian” period of analytical
chemistry. Elderhorst and his immediate successors, Goessmann and Nason, were
all pupils of the renowned German master, Friedrich Woehler.[2]Elderhorst, a
native of Celle in Hanover, introduced blowpipe analysis into
the curriculum and published a “Manual of Blowpipe Analysis” in 1856. A second
edition appeared shortly before he died of yellow fever on a trip to Venezuela in the summer of 1861. Though he
was connected with the Institute for only 6 years, he was highly esteemed as
a competent teacher and 13 years later (in 1874) a memorial window was dedicated
to his memory.

Elderhorst’s successor was Charles A. Goessmann
(1827-1910), a former assistant of Woehler who had
emigrated to America in 1856 and came to Troy in 1861 as professor of physics and
chemistry. This position was on a part-time basis since Goessmann
retained his job as chemist to the Salt Company of Onondaga in Syracuse, New
York, which he filled from 1860 to 1866.

The teaching of chemistry occupied
Goessmann during the winter months when there was
little activity in the salt works. Goessmann resigned in 1864 whereupon his place was taken by
his former pupil, Henry Bradford Nason (1831-95),
who had obtained his doctor’s degree under Woehler
in 1857 with a thesis on the formation of ether. Nason
was a versatile man of many accomplishments who was already connected with the
Institute since 1858 as professor of natural history, while at the same time
holding a similar professorship a t Beloit, Wisconsin. With Goessmann’s
departure Nason became a full-time professor a t the
Institute, teaching chemistry and mineralogy for 30 years (1864-94) and geology
from 1878 on. During this time he reedited Elderhorst’s
“Manual of Blowpipe Analysis” (1873) and brought out a completely revised fourth
edition in his own name in 1880. Besides this popular text he published in 1865
and in 1870 “Tables of Reactions for Qualitative Analysis” and in 1868 a translation
of Woehler’s “Handbook of Mineral Chemistry.” Although not an
alumnus of the Institute, Nason became secretary of
the Alumni Association and in that capacity published in 1887 his “Biographical
Record, 1824-86.” A general favorite with students, famous as Winslow Laboratory
Quizmaster and original narrator of the “Antimony Pill” story, Nason was equally popular among his fellow chemists who elected
him president of the American Chemical Society in 1890, in those “good old days”
when there were only 238 members instead of some 60,000 in 1949. A great many
changes occurred in Nason’s time. The great fire of
May 10,1862, caused by the sparks of a passing
locomotive setting fire to the shingled roof of the covered bridge over the
Hudson River, destroyed a considerable part of
the city of Troy, including the two Institute buildings.
A new MainBuilding was erected on Eighth Street in 1864. This was followed the next
year by the construction of the first chemical laboratory, the “Winslow Laboratory,”
named after a former president and benefactor of the Institute (Figure 2).

This three-story brick building, embodying
Nason’s plans for an up-to-date course in chemistry
and metallurgy, contained on the ground floor the metallurgical laboratory,
on the second the chemical laboratory, and on the third the library and the
lecture, recitation, and apparatus rooms, “fitted up in the most approved manner
for complete courses in general and analytical chemistry.”

Figure 2. Winslow Chemical Laboratory
North of OldMainBuilding

The original Eatonian
method of teaching was still used under Director Greene. In a privately published
biography of the noted educator, Nathaniel T. Allen (1823-1903), the following
statement occurs:

. . .having listened to a lecture, we were called upon the following day
to repeat the lecture. This was done in squads of eight with a gentleman “repeater” as critic, an
admirable discipline. The whole experience at the Institute I have always considered
extremely valuable. . . .

With the larger classes in the sixties,
it was no longer possible to require daily lectures from each student and daily
interrogations and blackboard demonstrations were substituted. The one-year
course leading to the degree of Bachelor of Natural Science had been transformed
by Director Greene into a two-year course in 1850 and on his departure in 1859
it was made into a three-year course (or including the preparatory year, a four-year
course) designed largely for future chemists.

This course did not flourish and was
discontinued after 1871. A total of only 14 B.S. degrees were conferred from
1850 to 1871. The B.S. course was revived in 1885, again as a four-year course
of which the first two were identical with the C.E. course while in the last
two years less higher mathematics and engineering was included but more natural
history, chemistry, and geology. This revival coincided with the appointment
of William Pitt Mason, Nason’s assistant, as professor
of analytical chemistry.

Mason, a C.E. of the class of 1874, had been connected
with the Institute since his graduation and enjoyed a great reputation as a
teacher. He was, judging from the student yearbooks of the eighties, not only
"the most popular and admired instructor" but also "our only
original searcher in the tangled paths of science." For his numerous publications
extending over a period of 40 years (1882-1922) reference is made to the list
published in 1947.[3] In 1885 4 B.S. degrees in the newly revised course were
conferred and the B.S. graduation theses from then on dealt mainly with topics
suggested by Dr. Mason whose specialty, then and later, was water analysis and
water supply. On the death of Nason in 1895 Mason
became his successor and was put in charge of all the courses taught in the
Winslow Laboratory.

Thanks to the student yearbook of
1897 (p. 137) one can readily get some idea of the kind of instruction imparted
to engineering students of 50 years ago (Figure 3) :

From October, when the
long aprons are donned for the first time, until March, the wash bottle and
evaporating dish, sulphuric acid, and H2S are faithfully used for 3 hours and “boil, filter, wash” is the motto of the
day. Then the juniors leave the laboratory for a season while Dr. Mason tells
delightful stories to Division A, at the same time giving lectures on metallurgy. The first
time a class sees the “lab” is in sophomore year when it is admitted to the
third story and takes the course in general chemistry.

Lastly, it finds in the
lower regions of the basement a most appropriate place for the
course in assaying. Here the juniors come together and in the same long aprons,
unrecognizable by long contact with acids and water, they toil before the long
row of pot ovens or swelter in
the glow of the muffle ovens as they watch the “silver buttons” or lift the
covers from the clay crucibles, buried in the fierce glow of the white-hot furnaces.
Then the main floor is turned over to its members. One word of parting must
be said to “Bummer,’ Lab. George, who makes every fellow feel as if he were
doing George a kindness by asking him
a question and who is always ready to do anything
for anybody.

The year 1904 proved to be another
eventful milestone in the history of R.P.I. The Winslow Laboratory, having been
partially destroyed by fire on two previous occasions (August, 1884, and October,
1902), in May, 1904, suffered, for the third time, from a case of internal combustion.
In the same year (June, 1904) the MainBuilding of the Institute was also destroyed
by fire.

Figure 3

This last disastrous fire, which
gave Trojans a chance to speak facetiously of their “pyrotechnic” Institute,
proved to be a blessing in disguise. Wealthy friends came to the rescue of the
Institute. As a result the present Walker Laboratory, named after a graduate
of the class of 1886, was erected in 1906.

This building, built according t o
plans drawn up by Mason, took care of 130 men in qualitative analysis and 74
in assaying. It was remodeled in 1913 and more than doubled in size by an addition
completed in 1920. Ample space and additional equipment opened up new opportunities
for the training of chemists and special two-year courses were given in the
new building. These courses, in which water analysis and sanitation chemistry
were particularly stressed, continued until 1925 and trained a number of analytical
chemists some of whom, later on, occupied important positions in water works
and filter plants.

Figure 4

At the same time (around 1908) new
lecture and laboratory courses were organized in physical and in organic chemistry.
Physical chemistry, which dates back to 1887 when the ZeitschriftfürphysikalischeChemiewas started, first was taught in America in 1895 at CornellUniversity by Wilder D. Bancroft, a former student
of van’t Hoff. It was Bancroft’s pupil and coworker,
Azariah T. Lincoln (1868-), the first Ph.D. in chemistry
at the University of Wisconsin, who introduced this subject at the Institute,
where he taught from 1907 to 1921 (Figure 4). American texts in this field of
endeavor were scarce in those days, English and translated German texts being
mainly used. Dr. Lincoln, therefore, prepared a text of his own published by
Heath & Co. in 1918. This text, one of the earliest in the field, was reprinted
in 1920 and was used for a number of years at the Institute. Other courses introduced
by Lincoln were industrial chemistry and food
analysis.

Organic chemistry which had been part
of the general course in chemistry for a great many years was not taught as
a separate, theoretical as well as practical course until the Walker Laboratory
was opened. It was Frederick W. Schwartz (B.S. 1905, Ph.D. Columbia University
1911), Mason's long-time assistant and his successor as professor of analytical
chemistry, who, from 1908 until 1925, was in charge of this course.

When these new courses were introduced
they took the place of other courses which were eliminated or else given in
some other department. The course in assaying for engineering students was dropped
in 1915 and a few years later also for B.S. and special students. Metallurgy
was turned over by Mason to a former student of his, Enrique Touceda
(C.E. 1887), who had become a practicing metallurgical engineer of wide repute.
Blow-pipe analysis gradually became a minor part of qualitative analysis and
in the early twenties it was dropped altogether.

This revamping of the chemical curriculum
proved to be of great value to the new department of chemical engineering. Under
the vigorous leadership of Director Palmer C. Ricketts, from 1901 to 1935 also
president of the Institute, two new departments, viz., those of mechanical and electrical
engineering had already been established a few years earlier (in 1908). In 1913
it was decided to start a fourth department, viz., chemical
engineering. In doing so, the Institute followed the lead of Columbia, Illinois,
Lehigh, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Missouri, Pennsylvania, Purdue, and Wisconsin, where chemical engineering departments
had already been functioning for some time. With the resignation of Dr. Mason
in 1925, after 50 years of service, the directorship of the Walker Laboratory
was taken over by Albert W. Davison (Figure 5).

Born in 1888, he was educated at DenisonUniversity (B.S. 1910), at OhioStateUniversity (M.A. 1911), and CornellUniversity (Ph.D. 1914). After three years of
teaching at the University of Cincinnati, he entered the United States Army
as captain in the Chemical Warfare Service. From 1919 to 1921 he was general
manager of the Virginia Haloid Corporation. In the
fall of 1921 he came to Troy as professor of physical chemistry
on the recommendation of his former teacher, Bancroft, taking the place of Dr.
Lincoln who had resigned to become head of the chemistry department at CarletonCollege. Davison recognized that the fundamental
difference between chemists and chemical engineers lies primarily in the quantities
of chemicals which they handle, necessitating totally different types of containers
and apparatus. With the active assistance of the members of his department,
Davison completely overhauled the chemical engineering curriculum, relegating
several of its courses to the B.S. course or dropping them altogether and replacing
them with courses in chemical plant design, factory management, unit operations,
and related subjects. At the same time machinery and equipment for pilot plant
operations were installed to bring the course up to the standards set by the
American Institute of Chemical Engineers, which placed the Rensselaer Institute
on its accredited list in June, 1925. The greatly altered character of the course
was also reflected in the type of theses presented by graduating chemical engineers.
Whereas formerly these dealt with small-scale experimental investigations, the
later ones consisted largely of plant designs for large-scale chemical production.

Charged with the added duties of a
professorship in chemical engineering Davison relinquished the teaching of physical
chemistry to the writer. In the same year (1925) Dr. Schwartz was relieved from
the task of giving courses in organic chemistry and from then on until his retirement
in the fall of 1948 confined his activities exclusively to courses in analytical
chemistry. Organic chemistry was taken over by Dr. J. B. Cloke,
a pupil of Stieglitz, first alone and later with the assistance of Dr.
W. Rauscher and others.

Figure 6. Number of Graduates 1910-49

(+ = Graduated in
December of preceding year)

Figure 5

The greatly augmented staff and the
new laboratory equipment installed in the twenties under the Davison regime
was necessitated, in part, by the establishment of new courses in chemistry,
physics, and biology. The old B.S. degree in general science, which, in practice,
was given to those who intended to become chemists, was replaced by the B.S.
in chemistry degree. In addition to this degree three other B.S. degrees (in
physics, biology, and business administration) were established. In the chemistry
curriculum a new course, colloid chemistry, an offspring of physical chemistry,
was given for the first time in 1928. Another new course, metallography,
likewise a branch of physical chemistry, was taught t o chemists and chemical
engineers beginning in 1924 and to students in civil and mechanical engineering
for the first time in 1923. This latter course took the place of the course
in qualitative analysis which was discontinued for C.E. and M.E. students. With
the establishment of a course in metallurgical engineering in 1936, the teaching
of metallography was transferred from the chemistry
to the metallurgy department.

On the completion of the Ricketts
Laboratory the existing chemical engineering equipment was moved from the Walker
Laboratory to the east wing of the Ricketts Laboratory where additional new
types of equipment were installed. The evacuated space in the Walker Laboratory
became available for more courses in physical and colloid chemistry and plastics.

The accompanying graph (Figure 6)
indicates the number of degrees given in chemistry and in chemical engineering
(since 1937 the Ch.E. degree was replaced by that
of B.S. in chemical engineering) from 1915 to 1949. During these years the number
of graduates in chemical engineering averaged around 40 annually, while the
number of graduating chemists has never exceeded 14 and dropped to one in 1944.
This was due to the fact that from July, 1943, to July, 1946, the Institute
operated on the Navy V-12 program, in which there was no place for chemists.

Dr. Davison resigned in the fall of
1942 to accept the position of Director of Research of the Owens-Corning Fibre
Glass Corporation in Newark (Ohio). In recognition of his long and
fruitful services to the Institute, the honorary degree of Doctor of Engineering
was conferred upon him in December, 1942. It was decided at that time to divide
the department of chemical engineering and chemistry into two separate departments.
This plan has just been carried out. Dr. John B. Cloke
has been appointed head of the chemistry department. Dr. Lewis S. Coonley
is head of the department of chemical engineering.

Just previous to and during the recent
war a number of changes occurred to which brief reference should be made. In
the first place, the old "intensive" system of teaching, viz., two classes of two hours each (lecture
followed by recitation) and a two-and-a-half hour laboratory period for two
successive seven-week periods, five days a week, followed by a four-week review
and examination period without laboratory work, was abandoned in July, 1943,
when the Navy curriculum went into effect. As a result, all courses are now
given on a semester basis and are run on essentially the same plan as that in
use at other engineering schools.

Another innovation occurred in 1942, 100 years
after Amos Eaton’s death when the Institute opened its doors to women, thus
becoming a coeducational institution. Eaton, as is well known, was no misogynist
(he was married four times!) and thoroughly believed in teaching science to
women. Due to the opposition of Van Rensselaer, Eaton was forced to instruct
girl students privately in a separate room of his residence, ingloriously called
the “sheep pen” by the regular male students.[4] Now, at long last, full equality of opportunity exists
and the Institute, at present, has already a few graduate alumnae in chemistry.

In the past ten years the Institute
has also abandoned the system of rigidly prescribed courses, to the extent that
students in their senior year and in some cases already in their junior year,
are permitted to drop one or two scheduled courses and substitute other courses
from a list of “technical” and “nontechnical” courses with the same number of “credit” hours.
While this system, obviously, is of some benefit to a number of students, the
fact remains that unavoidable schedule difficulties make the new system, if
not impossible, at least frequently difficult to execute.

Since the war has demonstrated the
extreme importance of new developments in science and engineering, new courses
have been introduced in various departments and it is not surprising to find
in the Walker Laboratory, since 1947, a small well-equipped laboratory for the
teaching of nuclear chemistry.

Realizing that the future of the Institute
would be better assured by active research on the part of faculty and student
body, Director Ricketts inaugurated in 1913 a graduate program of studies, leading
to advanced degrees in engineering and science. In order to encourage graduates
to take up advanced work, Mrs. Russell Sage, in 1913, established 2 fellowships
of $600 each with free tuition. Since 1923 10 more fellowships, likewise of
$600 each and free tuition, are awarded annually by the Board of Trustees.

Starting with 2 graduate students
in September, 1913, the number increased very slowly at first (6 in 1917, 9
in 1924, 15 in 1930), then more rapidly, and reached a maximum in 1931 when
the number of graduate students in engineering and science was 74 (including
37 instructors). Since that time the number has averaged around 60 annually.
On the outbreak of the war the number dropped sharply (only 7 in 1943). When
the war ended, the number increased rapidly (67 in 1946) and reached a peak
of 277 (of which number 34 were enrolled in chemistry and 8 in chemical engineering)
in the fall of 1948. The first Ph.D. degree in chemistry was conferred in 1926.
Of the total number of Ph.D. degrees conferred in the period 1913-49 (54) no
fewer than 32 were given in the chemistry department (15 in organic chemistry,
9 in physical chemistry, and 8 in analytical chemistry). Ten of these Ph.D.’s
in chemistry are professors at various universities and colleges, 2 entered
the services of the federal government, while the others are connected with
oil companies and various industrial concerns.

The results of the experimental and
theoretical studies pursued a t the Institute have been published in a number
of scientific journals and also, to a considerable extent, in a series of Institute
publications numbered consecutively from 1 to 58, which appeared from 1913 to
1943. Of these, a total of 8 dealt with work carried out in the Walker Laboratory.

While a considerable number of chemistry
students took up advanced work after graduation (from 1921 to 1949 80 M.S. and
32 Ph.D. degrees were conferred), the corresponding figures for chemical engineering
are, not withstanding the much larger number of graduates, comparatively small
(from 1921 to 1949: 54 M.S. and 4 D.Ch.E.).

In concluding this brief review of
the development of chemistry at R.P.I. in the past 125 years, the writer wishes
to thank those of his colleagues who have kindly supplied pertinent data, and,
last but not least, the faithful stockroom custodian, “Billy” Bolger, who was
present at the opening of the Walker Laboratory and is still going strong after
40 years of service.